05 April 2009

Taym Pers: On the cover

Julie (who's collating all Pinoywrimo excerpts) and Tina (the ML for NaNoWriMo Philippines) sent out a last call to authors for book covers last February. I hadn't sent anything in when I submitted my excerpt, and I kind of felt bad about it, so my creative juices giddily started flowing when I learned of the extended deadline ;-)

Since the story is basically chick lit, I wanted something attractive, girly, and funky. I scanned several covers for inspiration. Finally, it was the cover for Petite Anglaise, a novel based on Catherine Sanderson's blog, that helped me come up with a cover of my own.

I was looking for something that would evoke the landscape of Tokyo, so the multitude of buildings in the background above was perfect. If you look closely below, you'll notice I got a bit OC withe the architectural elements. Some of buildings included in the composition were Philippe Stark's Asahi building (popularly known as the Golden Poo), Meiji-jingu shrine, Yokohama Landmark Tower, Tokyo Metropolitan Government building, and the Fuji Terebi building in Odaiba. I added the sakura (cherry blossoms) for effect since Ana and Ken's story starts in spring ;-)

Next, I worked on the outlines of Ana and Ken. Ana's went through several revisions, first she was wearing a blouse and cullotes, and was walking rather than leaning on the torii. It must have taken me 2 days to find the right pose for her. Ken was easier. Making his Asian-ness apparent in the outline was a major challenge, but in the end, I decided that it was all in the physique and hairstyle. Japanese men are usually lean and have Kouji Kabuto type hair. However, instead of sketching as I did with Ana, I simply traced a photo of one of my fave Japanese actors (Guess who!!!) on Adobe Illustrator ;-)

All throughout the design phase, I wanted to echo the effect of the Eiffel tower on the cover of Petite, so I imagined a ginormous torii (Japanese gate) dominating the center of the cover. I think I'll tweak it a bit more if I find time, because it isn't as obvious as I wanted it to be. Plus, the colors on the .jpg file are more muted than they ought to be. sigh. Onscreen, the colors of the torii and the suitcases really jump out at you, but when I converted them, they lost a lot of oomph. sad.

On the whole however, I'm glad with the way the cover has turned out and am already envisioning the covers for the next books ;-)

hi i like the cover that you made. it's really, really well made.. is adobe illustrator the only program that you use? it's real nice, hope to learn from you. have a nice day. and thanks also for commenting on my post.

Argh, sorry. I probably won't be able to follow you here. Too much to read and I'm quite busy these days. But maybe in the next few months, I might be able to read everything you wrote. Just keep on writing!

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About Me

C. P. Santi is a Filipina writer based in Tokyo, Japan. She is a wife to an engineer / musician / jokester and a full-time mom to two energetic boys. She loves cooking and feeding people, gorging on chocolate, watching J-doramas, belting it out in the karaoke box, and running around the house playing tickle tag. She also loves dreaming up stories about the people she meets.
In another life, she is also an architect and academic.